“Florry, you needn’t be bloody shirty in this matter.”
“You see, I’m anxious to be on with it. Do you know why?”
“I suppose I cannot prevent you from telling me.”
“Because I am sick of the whole thing. I want to do what must be done and get on with it.”
“Good,” Sampson said. “You should know that we believe that Julian’s signup is another step in the proof, so to speak. Another whiskey? Boy! Good heavens, I’m supposed to call him ‘comrade,’ as if he’s an old school chum. Comrade! Another round, please.”
The sounds of gaiety had suddenly begun to pick up from the out-of-doors. Florry could hear a snatch of music, the rush of many voices. The afternoon sing had begun.
Arise, ye prisoners of starvation
Arise, ye wretched of the earth
For Justice thunders condemnation
A better world’s in birth.
“Wonderful sentiments, eh?” said Sampson, with his tight, prim, fishy smile. “It’s a pity they go about murdering chaps, isn’t it?”
“Get on with it, Sampson. The game isn’t amusing anymore.”
Sampson smiled. He was enjoying the game immensely.
“We have been aware for some time that the Russian secret police’s intelligence on its factional rivals—the POUM, the Anarchists, the trade unions, the bloody parade marchers—has been exceedingly good. In fact, there seems to be a secret war going on. Key people in the opposition disappear in the dead of night; they turn up dead, or they never turn up at all, they simply vanish. It’s just a racket, isn’t it? One mob of gangsters rubbing out another. But the Russians have got to know who to take, eh? Can’t just take anybody. And so who better to go among the enemy than a seemingly innocent British journalist with a brilliant, wondrous, easy charm? It fits with what we know. He wouldn’t report to anybody here, except some control fellow, who would send his information straight back to Moscow via the Amsterdam route that was so important to them. Then the orders go out from Moscow; there’s no direct contact between Julian and the local goons. He’s never compromised. It’s quite clever.”
Florry stared at him.
“So it’s murder, then? Yet another level of debauchery.”
“In for a penny, in for a pound. Now it appears this secret war may be moving into another, perhaps ultimate, phase. What better way, really, to get to the inner workings of POUM than to place their best agent among its militia, near to its military headquarters at La Granja? And, for the record, it doesn’t appear that he’s in any great danger. The real fighting’s still around Madrid. Out near Huesca, it’s mostly potting about in the mud. If one keeps one’s bum down, one has an excellent chance at surviving. The only thing he’s really given up is his abundant corps of female admirers. Still, one has to do what one must for the wonderful revolution, eh?”
“You’re as cynical as a whore.”
“The profession inclines one thus. And it is, come to think of it, rather a brothel. And I must say I take the cynic’s pleasure in another’s discomfort: the idea of Julian Raines potting about in the mud is quite amusing. At university, he and his lot were such dandies.”
“You knew him?”
“Everybody knew him. He has a gift for getting known, quite apart from other gifts.”
Florry took a drink of the whiskey.
“So if you must go off and be a hero for that lovely girl, then, go,” said Sampson. “Perhaps it may even work out for the best.”
It suddenly dawned on Florry how much Sampson had thought about all this. “I’ve made it easy on you, haven’t I?” he said.
Sampson smiled. Florry hated him.
“I suppose you have. You rather conveniently started where I had hoped to finish. The major’s most recent communication reached me last night. He said it was imperative that you join the Lenin Division. He left it to me to engineer a way. You spared me that, old man.”
“You are a whore, Sampson.”
“Of course I am. But one likes to think of oneself as a good whore. But let’s not part enemies, old man, even if we did go to different public schools. If you’ve a mind, do drop in, and bring that girl. I’ve rented a villa out in the Sarrea district. Big, damned drafty place, rather nice. They go for a song these days. I’ll have my man do up a nice meal. We’ll have a bash.”
Florry got up to leave. “Er, it sounds fine. Let me give you a ring on it or something.”
“Splendid. By the way, there’s one other interesting little tidbit that might be of some help to you,” Sampson said.
He turned back.
“Yes. There’s a rumor afoot that Julian’s old friend Levitsky is in Barcelona. You might keep your eye open.”
“And how would I know Levitsky? Do you think me a mind reader?”
“Good God, no. But you would know him because you arrived with him. He traveled undercover on that ship. He survived the sinking too, evidently.”
Florry looked at the fishy young Englishman who smirked up at him. Yet what he suddenly felt was the memory of an odor.
Peppermint.
11
IGENKO
LEVITSKY, FROM THE WINDOW, WATCHED IGENKO APPROACH.
The man was prissy, a bit pudgy. His white suit wore immense, dark crescents under the armpits. He needed a shave. He looked desperately uncomfortable.
Come, little one, Levitsky thought.
The man wandered with not a small amount of trepidation the winding, evil-smelling, narrow streets of the Barrio Chino, which was just beginning to fill with customers as the night began. Even the revolution had not halted the practice of certain ancient professions and in the Barrio Chino, in the warren of overhanging buildings, balconies bright with wash, amid the smell of garbage and piss, amid the little bars where Spanish men stood and ate and talked the nights away, the tarts had come out, mingling with sailors, soldiers, politicians, and revolutionaries; a hundred little nightclubs had half-open doors that promised certain otherwise unavailable delights inside.
As Levtisky watched, prim, chubby Igenko tried to melt into the cosmopolitan crowd, evidently terrified first that he was under observation by the NKVD and second that he might be stopped by an Anarchist patrol. For the Anarchists controlled the Barrio Chino, which is why it was able to flourish, but the Anarchists were not terribly fond of Russians.
But the man was stopped by no one, fortunately, and after a time consulted a watch. He seemed to take a deep breath, as if in search of his courage, and, with a last glance at the world around him, ducked out of sight.
Levitsky waited. He could imagine poor Igenko’s ordeal as he negotiated the protocols of the brothel. In time, Levtisky knew he approached: he could hear the girls cooing.
“Hey, sugar tits, come see me, I’ll make a man out of you.”
“Put your little thing in a woman’s hole, princess.”
“Lick my titties and I’ll show you things you never saw in your life, dolly.”
Poor Igenko, pretending to stoicism. Teenage boys frequently yelled things at him and the whores knew, too. Levitsky wondered—how did they know? So surely, how did they know? How did everybody know?
Outside the door, they stopped.
“In here,” Levitsky heard the girl say. “Now give me the money.”
There was a pause, as Igenko dug through his wallet.
“You Russians,” she said. “Through the eyes and the nose, you all look the same. Fat or thin, you all look the same.” She left him.
Igenko opened the door and stepped into the darkness.
“Ivanch? Ivanch, are you there?” he called, using the most intimate abridgment of Levitsky’s middle name.
“Were you seen?”
“Ivanch, thank God you’re all right.”
“Close the door!” Levitsky hissed.
Igenko closed the door. There were another few seconds of silence and then the light came on.
“God, Ivanch. You look dreadful.”
“God
had nothing to do with it, I assure you,” said Levitsky. He held himself with grave care, because the pain was still intense. His face was pinched and drawn.
Yet it was Igenko who seemed close to coming apart. He sat on the bed, heaving and breathing wretchedly, struggling for his breath, his pallid skin becoming chalkier. “It’s so terrible. They beat you?”
“Of course they beat me. They’re serious about their work.”
Igenko began to weep. He covered his eyes with his dainty handkerchief and made sniveling sounds.
“Is it really that awful?” said Levitsky.
“You were such a handsome man. To see you like this is almost more than one can take.”
“Don’t concern yourself. It’s nothing I won’t recover from.”
“We heard that you were here. There were rumors. That the NKVD had—”
“What about my escape?”
“Nothing. Nothing at all. That is why I was so stunned when your note reached me.”
Levitsky laughed harshly, through pain.
“Glasanov has gotten himself into a terrible mess. He can’t let anybody know I’m gone or he’s on his way back to Moscow for a bullet in his neck. So he must catch me without officially admitting I’ve flown. Let’s see him bluff his way out of this!” He enjoyed it immensely.
“Ivanch, how did you manage to—”
Levitsky laughed again.
“Don’t concern yourself. One simply does what one must.”
But it had been quite simple. Levitsky laughed at the memory. They are so stupid, these new fellows. Some inheritors! He looked about the cell in his hour of need and noted by the variation of color on the stone that for centuries a crucifix had been hung above the pallet. He reasoned that surely such a device must have been affixed to the stone in some fashion or other. It didn’t take much cunning to find a nail sunk in the crevices of the stone—an ancient thing, there for centuries. A strong tug and it was his.
He felt his trophy in his pocket now—a wicked lance of black iron, perhaps four inches long.
He used it to pick the lock. Then, reasoning he had no chance to escape in full daylight, he simply slipped into the cell next door, where his hardest problem was to stifle his laughter during the great Commissar Glasanov’s rage. When he and his Amerikanski finally left, Levitsky went back to his original cell, figuring that it would be the safest place. He waited there until nightfall, then made his way out.
“I suspected that an Anarchist neighborhood would offer the least chance of NKVD observation, and so here I am. Safe, if not quite sound,” he told Igenko.
“You are brilliant, Emmanuel. As usual. You always were.” Igenko’s little eyes shone with respect and admiration.
He reached and touched Levitsky on the knee, with a weak, hopeful smile. “I’ve always been your staunchest supporter. Your greatest admirer. You know that.”
“I need help, Ivan Alexyovich. I need it badly.”
“I understand. You can trust me. I owe you so much. I will do anything for you.”
“Yes.”
“Anything. Use me in any way to advance your plan.”
“All right. All right, Alexyovich.”
Igenko began to weep. He put his head down on the bed and cried. Levitsky stroked the back of his fat neck and crooned to him gently.
“It’s been so long,” Igenko said.
“So many years. Since 1919. Come on, wipe your tears, old Ivan Alexyovich. Stop whimpering.”
“I’ll be all right, now that you’re here.”
“Of course you will.”
“I know I can help. I’m a clerk in the Maritime Commission. I know people in the port. People owe me things. I’ve done favors. I can get you out. I can get you on a ship. To Africa maybe, to America, even.”
“No.”
“Emmanuel, they’ll kill you. Glasanov and his monster Bolodin. They’re feared everywhere in Barcelona. The Comintern people dread them. The radicals and the Anarchists are terrified of them.”
His voice rose in pitch; he was verging on hysteria.
“Listen, Ivan Alexyovich, please. Calm yourself, and listen. I need money. And I need a place to go to earth for a while. It’s only a question of a few days before they begin to run down the brothels, even in the Anarchist neighborhoods.”
“Glasanov controls the SIM, and the SIM is everywhere.”
“I know. That’s why time is so desperate. But mostly I need papers. Above all, I need papers. I need to be somebody.”
“I can give you money. I have twenty pieces of gold. I’ve had them for years. I can sell them. And I can find a place where you can hide. And as for the papers—well, it’s not my line, but I can certainly try.”
“And one last thing. That watch. The watch is important to me.”
“Why, yes. Of course. You gave it to me, of course. I give it back.”
“Thanks, old friend.”
Levitsky took the thing from Igenko, quickly strapped it to his wrist.
“Here. Take what little money I have now,” Igenko said. He pushed over a wad of pesetas. “I’ll get the gold tomorrow.”
“Are you observed?”
“Everybody is observed. The NKVD is everywhere, just like the SIM.”
“They are the same, one supposes.”
“I am not observed regularly. I’ve some freedom.”
“All right. I’ll move to another bordello tonight. Can you get back to me tomorrow?”
“I-I think.”
“On the Ramblas, across from the Plaza Real. Among the stalls in the center. There’s one where an old lady sells chicken on a spit. Do you know it?”
“I’ll find it.”
“Meet me there at seven. Carry a briefcase. You have a briefcase?”
“Yes.”
“If you think you’ve been followed, carry it in your right hand. If you know it’s safe, carry it in your left. Do you understand?”
“Yes. Right, danger; left, safe.”
“As it once was in politics.”
“Please be careful, Ivanch. Please.” He touched Levitsky’s thigh in an absentminded way.
“Ivan Alexyovich, if you help me, we can both get away. You and me, we’ll get out, in just a few days. We’ll go to America together.”
“Yes.”
“Go now. Hurry, so that you aren’t missed at the Colon.”
Igenko stood to leave, but paused. “Ivanch, it’s wonderful that you’re here.”
The fat man smiled. “And I want you to know, whatever you do. Whatever. It’s all right. Do what you must. Do you understand?”
Levitsky looked at him. “I’ll do what I have to, Ivan Alexyovich.”
Igenko hurried out.
Levitsky stood up slowly, feeling the ache in his ribs. You are an old man. You are nearly sixty, much too old for this.
He turned and saw himself in the mirror. He snapped the light out quickly, for he could not look upon his own face.
It was a question of timing, of careful calibration. Levitsky had decided that six was the ideal hour; an hour later and they would have too much time to think, to plot out the various possibilities, to counterplan against his game. An hour earlier and they might not be able to bring it off: the system would break down somewhere and he’d pay his dear price for nothing.
Accordingly, he left the barrio at five the next afternoon, at last reaching the crowded Ramblas and turning up it, toward the Plaza de Catalunya. Oh, the cafés were jammed this bright late afternoon, beginning to fill up for another evening of celebration. All revolutions always love themselves first; it is a rule. As he climbed along the central strip, walking among the trees and benches and stalls and street lamps, the busy density of the place momentarily dizzied him. The hunted man is safest in crowds, and here the masses were a torrent. Bright banners, heroic proclamations, bold portraits flapped off the buildings. Several of the cafés had been reconsecrated to political usage, as well as alcoholic: the UGT had one, and so did the FAI and the
POUM; it was like a bazaar of crazed political ideas. He continued, until he reached the splurge of freedom of the open space of the plaza itself, where the last of the great battles of July had been fought and students and workers and slum boys had overwhelmed the army’s final position at great loss. He traversed the martyred ground, avoiding the Hotel Colon on one side, with its PSUC banner and its huge picture of the great Koba and its smart NKVD troops at their machine-gun nests behind the sandbags and the barbed wire. He headed instead to another key building in the fighting, the Telefonica, whose façade was still pocked with bullet marks from the battle. It was the central telephone exchange, and who controlled it, controlled all communications in Barcelona. But before he reached it, Levitsky stopped to check Igenko’s watch: quarter to six. He was early. He sat on a bench. A parade started up as Levitsky waited. He looked at it with some contempt.
Parades!
He watched as the ragtag Spanish cavalry marched down the street. The beasts were not well-trained, and the troopers had difficulty holding them in the formation. He could see them scuffle and pull at their reins. A shiver passed through him. Horses were such terrible creatures.
At precisely six o’clock, he crossed the wide street and entered the exchange. He found himself in a vast central office. A man came up in the uniform of one of the crazy anarchist groups. Anarchists running a telephone exchange? It was madness.
“Business, comrade?”
“Of the most urgent kind,” Levitsky said.
“You are foreign. Come to help our revolution or to loot it?”
“Does this answer?” said Levitsky, and he rolled up his right sleeve to show a tattoo on his biceps. It was the tattoo of a black fist.
“You are one of us, then. Salud, brother. It looks as if it’s been there a few years.”
“Almost as long as the arm itself. From the time before there was time.”
“What business have you?”
“To place a call.”
“Go on, then. While it’s there. When at last we tear down the government we will also tear down the telephone lines, and then all men will be free.”
Tapestry of Spies Page 11